Every leader of such a movement by definition must be an extremist, even if it makes them look foolish
Why? RMS's movement would benefit most from convincing us, as developers, to contribute to FOSS. I pray that being a foolish-looking extremist isn't the best way to do that.
Again, going with the ACLU analogy, it's not the ACLU's job to convince you that the Bill of Rights is a good thing. It's their job to rigorously defend it without giving an inch. The same goes for RMS, it's not his job to convince developers to join up with FOSS. Leave the convincing to people who are better at it. Google's summer of code is a great example.
Based on the growing size and productivity of the FOSS community, I really don't think RMS needs to change what he is doing. Programmers have already produced billions of dollars of free software and will continue to do so. It's an amazing display of our (the hacker) culture.
Why? RMS's movement would benefit most from convincing us, as developers, to contribute to FOSS. I pray that being a foolish-looking extremist isn't the best way to do that.